The issues no one talks about

Friday

Nov 2, 2012 at 12:01 AMNov 2, 2012 at 4:36 PM

After mind-numbing campaigns that seemed as though they would never end, we’re down — mercifully — to the final hours of the 2012 election. Tuesday, Alamance County folks who haven’t cast ballots early — and there are thousands of you — will decide who they want to lead from the courthouse to the White House.

Whether voting this week for president, governor or any office on down to school board, we believe party labels matter less than the candidate’s stand on key areas where government intersects with people’s lives.

In the course of their terms, office-holders will vote on issues that have not surfaced during the campaign season. To know their belief — and for incumbents, their record — on these key areas is the best predictor of how they will lead.

Those key areas are:

Transparency— Your ability to know how your government operates is central to preserving freedom, the cornerstone of America.

Frequently on this page, we write that the people are the government, established in this country’s founding documents.Politicians and bureaucrats hold no special status to know what you cannot know.To believe and to demonstrate otherwise through one’s actions while in office is to open the door to corruption and wrong-doing, harmful speculation and distrust.Good government results from openness, not secrecy.Anyone holding or seeking public office must be held accountable.

Fiscal Responsibility— Whether it is your wallet or your government’s finances, living beyond one’s means carries crippling consequences.In the same way that you cannot buy all of your desires on your credit card without facing the bill when it comes, government cannot borrow to make good all politicians’ promises without committing future tax dollars and risking runious tax increases.

Political promises sound good during campaigns, but paying for those promises can result in increased debt and higher taxes.Unchecked taxation and debt weaken the ability of government to meet its core responsibilities of protecting citizens and safeguarding freedoms.

Free enterprise— The more government intervenes in business, the more business is handicapped and unable to flourish. Businesses are left to focus attention on complying with a politically motivated regulations — mandating gas mileage on cars, for example — rather than producing better products and services. Such rules increase a business’ cost, resulting in higher prices for consumers.Without government involvement, consumers determine the success of any business by deciding whether they want to make a purchase and at what price. Too often, politicians wrap regulations in the cloak of consumer protection, wrongly claiming that they are looking out for you.Don’t buy it.Freedom, not regulations, allows entrepreneurs to create new products and established businesses to grow. The result will be more jobs and a stronger economy.

Individual Liberty — Here again, the guarantee of individual liberty can be found in the founding documents of America.All too often, government usurps individual liberty and one’s ability to determine what is best for himself or herself.It happens locally with zoning laws, which give government, not the property owner, control over one’s land.It happens nationally when people are required to buy health insurance or banned from owning certain types of weapons.In countless ways, government creeps into your personal life, mandating how you live.The best candidates for office are those who protect the freedom of individuals to determine their own destiny.

We encourage you to know where candidates stand on these key areas and to cast your ballot for candidates who best support safeguarding the freedom that is our American way of life.